The Department of Homeland Security posted a promotional video quoting Proverbs that implies undocumented immigrants are wicked and the law enforcement agents pursuing them are righteous. Insurrectionists convicted of assaulting police officers on Jan. 6 portray themselves as Israelites freed from Egypt by a presidential pardon but who now are wandering in the desert as they hope to reach the Promised Land, where the government takes the extreme step of paying them reparations.
This is the strange and dangerous way religion and politics are mixing in the contemporary United States. Biblical verses and stories are being warped to advance partisan agendas and ideological causes. The underlying goal is not scriptural fidelity, but advancing power at seemingly any cost. The Bible is a useful tool for that end. The Church’s witness is collateral damage.
How do we make sense of this confusing moment? It requires a wise guide. Someone with a deep Christian commitment, an understanding of how religious rhetoric and symbols operate in the public square, and a well-trained eye for tracking the news and seeing what others — especially those without a background in religion — tend to miss.
That sage voice belongs to Brian Kaylor and is insightfully expressed in his new book, The Bible According to Christian Nationalists: Exploiting Scripture for Political Power.
At this point two disclaimers are in order: First, Brian and I co-authored Baptizing America, so I already understood and appreciated the interpretative lens he brings to how the sacred and the secular intersect. Second, Brian is the editor-in-chief of Word&Way. I am a (very) part-time employee of the publication, but I am paid to write this review and he’ll be hitting publish on the piece. I’m clearly biased, but I choose to write this review of my own accord and he won’t make any substantive changes to this piece. (Brian, did I say that convincingly enough so our readers won’t know you threatened to fire me unless I penned a glowing review?)
Seriously though, this is an important book sadly demanded by our times. In a society where national and Christian identities are fused, Scripture shows up in conspicuous yet incoherent ways. The Bible According to Christian Nationalists is the codebook that deciphers it all.
Rather than get serious about reducing gun violence through common-sense reforms that limit access to firearms, you’ll discover how some legislators believe posting the Ten Commandments in classrooms will magically reduce school shootings. You’ll be appalled to read how Oklahoma officials debated the meaning of a verse in Proverbs when deciding whether to allow teachers to use corporal punishment against children with disabilities. You’ll also see how self-styled prophets suffer from confirmation bias in assigning significance to chapter and verse numbers that justify the stances they already hold (and with no apparent understanding that these numbers aren’t original to the biblical text).
“This book zeroes in on how the Bible is (mis)used to advance Christian Nationalism,” Brian writes in the opening chapter. “The fact that such appeals to the Bible frequently appear in Christian Nationalistic discourse shows why we can’t just say it’s not Christian and therefore ignore it. Christians have a responsibility not only to beware of this toxic ideology but also to push back against such heretical co-option of our faith.”
You might find yourself pushing back because a) you and your church don’t use the Bible this way or b) there’s enough negativity in the world right now, so you don’t want to subject yourself to even more. Those are understandable reactions, but I would encourage you not to look away. It’s impossible to confront and challenge such abuse without first understanding what’s going on. Denying reality risks complicity in normalizing the absurd.
That’s why Brian ends the book with positive ways of engaging Scripture both in our churches and civic life. Rather than selectively using texts to justify our preferences, we need to read Scripture on its own terms and see what illumination it offers. We can’t cherry-pick isolated verses that conform to the views we already hold, but must develop a reading ethic informed by the wisdom of the Christian tradition. Finally, those of us in predominantly White American churches need to listen to voices on the margins and how differently the Bible sounds when interpreted through circumstances and experiences.
This is a book that is so valuable because the times we are living in are so perilous. It’s a book you urgently need to read, but should not have been necessary to write.
Brian is a Baptist minister, an award-winning journalist, and holds a doctorate in political communication. There’s nobody better equipped to make sense of what’s going on in our public life. He’s going to sign and send a copy of The Bible According to Christian Nationalists to five lucky paid subscribers of A Public Witness, so upgrade your subscription today!
But go ahead and pre-order the book; if you win the random drawing, you can just give the non-signed copy to a friend. It’s already available to order at Bookshop, Chalice Press, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Target, and elsewhere.
As a public witness,
Beau Underwood
By the way, you can learn even more about The Bible According to Christian Nationalists in this week’s episode of Dangerous Dogma as I interviewed Brian. Listen to the audio version here (or wherever you listen to podcasts) or watch the video version here.